


Today Is Brought To You By The Letter H

by fuzzy_paint



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Crack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-09
Updated: 2012-12-09
Packaged: 2017-11-20 16:35:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/587474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzy_paint/pseuds/fuzzy_paint
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sesame Street teaches Hulk empathy. Much to the horror/amusement/shock of everyone, including Bruce, Hulk endeavors to teach it to Loki.</p>
<p>With hugs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Today Is Brought To You By The Letter H

**Author's Note:**

> Like most things in my life, the fault of this lies completely with tumblr. Inspired by the "Avengers Need Good Press" gif sets, particularly [this one](http://killianing.tumblr.com/post/23318970508/banner-but-why-me-and-why-sesame-street-coulson) and [this one](http://killianing.tumblr.com/post/23371084191/the-avengers-need-good-press-in-which-xavier). 
> 
> I'm so sorry.

Like most things in Bruce's life, the fault of _this_ lies completely with the Other Guy.

He wants to blame it on Fury; the whole Sesame Street thing was his damn idea in the first place, but since the accident that started all of this, it's been the Other Guy creating a whirlwind of his life, leaving Bruce to wake up in Guadalajara when he fell asleep in Mexico City, to wander naked in the countryside and face down farmers with shotguns, to breaking Harlem. 

"Third time," Barton says, grinning, bow in one hand but at his side and not strung. He has a theory, Bruce knows. Bruce has heard all about Barton's theory. The team has heard all about Barton's theory and have expounded on it themselves, grinning and cackling and referencing the footage. 

Darcy prepared a photo essay on it. With footnotes. And photographic evidence. She put it on Facebook.

Bruce understands theories and hypotheses, and really, after three times, he can't fault the empirical evidence that's starting to mount. A trend repeating is worth investigation. Two data points does not make a trend, but three. Three is a little concerning, especially for the Other Guy. His noticeable patterns only involve wholesale destruction, astronomical amounts of property damage and lots of broken bones. 

And protecting Betty, which is his only trend Bruce does not find fault with.

"This is," Tony says, faceplate lifting away as he lands, "Almost absolutely terrifying, I think."

The part of the Other Guy that is still Bruce, still aware enough to process the happenings around him, but not enough to have any sort of control, feels a little flabbergasted. Definitely uncertain. The Other Guy has done a lot of shocking things in their time together, but this takes the angry green cake.

That part of Bruce has no answer for Tony. 

The part that is wholly and completely the Other Guy, still boiling with rage, tightens his arms around Loki and sort of... rocks. 

Loki meeps. 

 

 

Loki slips away, of course, as soon as the Other Guy loosens his arms enough. He disappears quickly to wherever it is that Loki goes when he's not trying to wreak havoc in their backyard. To plot, probably, or maybe seek a chiropractor. Despite Loki's seeming disdain of all things that originate from Earth, Bruce finds that course of action unsurprisingly likely, given the Other Guy's strength.

The first time, Bruce thought he'd intended to crack him in half, pop him like a glow stick, constricting like the boa that tried to eat the Other Guy that one time in a Brazilian jungle, but he'd only tightened his arms until Loki was immobilized. Swearing furiously, but otherwise unable to do much harm to anyone.

Except, perhaps, the sensibilities of any of the bystanders that always seem to find their way into the battles. That is, of course, if any of them speak vulgar Shakespeare in the Park, but bright red ears never harmed anyone.

 

 

"Empathy," Clint says. Natasha elbows him, but the corners of her mouth curve up as Agent Fury considers that. As they all consider that, sitting around their group debriefing table. 

Clint’s theory is all about Empathy. 

Bruce knows all about Empathy.

"Maybe the big guy bonded," Steve says. 

It’s as good a theory as any. Except that it doesn’t make any sense. One three minute appearance on Sesame Street is not going to make the Other Guy sit down and play nice with others. Especially when his default response to Asgardians is pretty much a punch to the face. 

He'd like to blame it on Murray, but while Murray may be a colorful creature, and therefore somehow kin to the Other Guy by Fury’s logic - if infinitely more cuddly and loveable - Bruce is logical, overall, when he isn't sharing a head-space with a giant green rage monster, and he really can't blame Murray for this. He is, after all, only a puppet. 

“With a puppet,” Bruce says. “And he’s what? Transferring that affection to Loki?”

"It makes some sense," Tony says, the traitor. "Loki is quite the angry rage monster, and the Other Guy is also full of angry rage. If greener. Really, it’s all about emotions."

Bruce rubs between his eyebrows. Some days, on missions like this, he almost misses the isolation of being on the lam. 

 

 

Loki pops up again only a few short weeks later, pulling the clouds in over New York, dark angry clouds that look more yellow than what Bruce knows is naturally possible. 

He has access to a whole universe at his fingertips; can't the guy find somewhere else to cause chaos? 

Loki weaves a net of magic in the clouds and pulls it down on them, trapping Cap and Thor and Hulk. Whenever Thor calls lightening, it reflects back on them until Thor’s hair puffs out like Farah Fawcett and Cap starts to look rather crisp around the edges. 

The Hulk rends at the enclosure, twisting, not caring about collateral damage, or Bruce’s attempts to guide the Other Guy through a logical pathway. Like always, it does little good. The worst part of this whole thing isn’t the transformation or the rage. It’s that the Other Guy doesn’t listen, doesn’t care to even when Bruce is _right_ , especially not now, not when he’s twisting and kicking, tangling up in the thin lines of magic that produce shocks that even Bruce can feel, buried under all the green muscle. It drives the anger into full-speed. It’s truly no relief at all, but at least Thor and Cap can take it.

With Clint off on a mission and Tony in Monaco with Pepper, the battle comes down to hand to hand with Natasha. She’s quick, dodging out of his reach and back in, like she’s playing tag. When Loki knocks her down, she rolls to her feet, and they continue their dance, one neither of them is willing to concede. 

Eventually, something has to give. 

They’re still stuck in the net when Loki wins the advantage, holding her up with his superior strength. Loki will throw her to the ground, crack her back, _break her_ -

Hulk roars and finds the physical weakness in the net, magic bound to real cords, and he rends it around them, air charged with the electricity Thor called forth earlier. It races across his muscles, fueling the rage to such brighter heights that Bruce, the part of him that makes him Bruce, is almost nonexistent, a tiny point of conscious suffocated by wrath. 

Natasha twists in some complicated manner and ends up on Loki’s back, arms around his neck. Bruce sees her muscles tighten, restricting his airway. Loki bucks; Natasha holds on tighter, but her arms slip, wrapping around his chest, and Loki - 

Loki _falters_. Missteps, and the confusion on Tasha's face echoes in Bruce. The Other Guy just charges forward. Bruce yells; Natasha is not as resilient as a demigod, but the Other Guy just scoops them both up from behind and then plops to the ground, legs folded under him, Loki tucked in one arm and Natasha in the other.

"Oh my god," she says faintly as Loki starts to swear, a mixture of universal swear words and Asgardian words Bruce is pretty sure equivocate to words not appropriate for _anyone_.

Loki lashes out at her. Or attempts to. The Other Guy tightens his arm, locking Loki in place, arms at his sides, legs kicking until he realizes he’s not getting anywhere, and he slouches down in defeat.

His grip on Natasha is almost loose in comparison, if still firm. The other guy rubs his chin on the top of her head, back and forth, back and forth. Something bubbles up inside him. It's too close to rage, leaving Bruce to taste the panic of it, but it isn't rage, this rumbling deep within his chest.

"Oh my god," she says again, and starts to laugh, forehead pressed against the Hulk's shoulder. 

That sound inside him? 

_It isn’t rage._

 

 

They have other battles, of course, with other bad guys - Dr. Doom and an army of plant like creatures that only appear biological until the Other Guy rips them open and the wires and cables fall out, interspersed with a visit from Enchantress and her protégé, Sylvie, and then the ever present run-ins with HYDRA goons.

Hulk doesn't attempt to hug any of them. 

At least, not until the Brotherhood starts ripping holes in downtown Manhattan, causing enough chaos that the X-men actually welcome Avenger aid. It’s mostly under control by the time Bruce realizes that when the Other Guy leaps from the building, he’s actually breaking away from the team and heading into the dying fray. 

It’s not the Scarlet Witch he heads for. It’s not Pietro he tries to catch as he speeds away once their mission’s either derailed or somehow completed. 

He heads right for the X-Men. 

Right for Logan. 

In the back of their head, the part that’s still Bruce groans into his hands. This is going to be bad. The last time the Other Guy and Wolverine tangled, they’d leveled an entire forest in Northern Canada. The time before that was a research lab in Nova Scotia. The time before that is better left unsaid. 

He still has his claws out, and drops into a defensive stance, but the Other Guy ignores the way they cut into his skin and scoops Wolverine into his arms, holding him close. 

Wolverine starts swearing and there’s a moment of stiff spine - he won’t crack him in half, not with that adamantium on his bones, one thing Bruce isn’t sure the other guy could break. He’s not ready to test that, though - but then Wolverine’s claws retract and he _hugs him back._

“This just got a little weird,” Natasha says. 

Rogue glances at her from the corner of his eye. “Just?” 

“Empathy,” Clint says, grinning. 

Rogue touches her mouth and chin, clearly thinking. “He’s been very… focused since-”

“Sesame Street?” Cap asks. He points at the Other Guy and Bruce and Logan, still locked around each other, as if in a competition of who can hug the hardest. Maybe who can hug the longest; Bruce isn’t sure of anything anymore. “Since then, Hulk wants to hug everyone.” 

“Not everyone,” Natasha says. “Just Loki. And Logan.” 

Rogue snickers. “Maybe it’s the letter L.”

Wolverine lets go long enough to give them the finger. 

Tony considers that. “Is it weird that I actually find that reassuring?” 

The big guy just bundles Logan closer, making a pleased sound in his chest, and Bruce wonders if his life could possibly get any stranger. 

 

 

Bruce retreats his labs in Stark Tower, which really might have been a retreat once upon a time. Tony comes and goes as he pleases, such is Tony's way; Bruce doesn't mind, but the rest of the team usually refrains from wandering in and out. The recent addition of Jane Foster in their mix, however, sees Thor frequenting the lab more often than he used to. At least Jane’s rule against smashing pertains to him as well as it does to Bruce.

Usually, he’s here to see her, though, and not Bruce. 

“Is it a courting ritual?” Thor asks as soon as he clears the doorway. “Such an embrace is reserved for family or for lovers on Asgard. I confess only Jane has greeted me thusly, so I do not know if the custom is the same in this realm.” 

Bruce stares at him before he sets aside his tablet. “Friends hug,” he says. “But that’s not what this is. I don’t know what this is.” 

“Clint says that it is a result of your sojourn with the colorful Midgardian beasts of the land of Sesame Street. Perhaps these small fuzzy creatures can help my brother. If they aided the beast inside you, could they not aid Loki?"

Bruce is suddenly very certain that no one has explained to Thor that Sesame Street is just a children’s show. And that those colorful Midgardian beasts are actually just puppets. But Thor, who has probably seen creatures more terrifying than Elmo every day of his life, whose cultural heritage revolves around fantastical and impossible true stories, probably suspects it is. 

There is magic in storytelling, any kid knows that, but it’s been a long time since Bruce was a kid. 

“I don’t think Loki would go for that,” he says instead. It’s true: Loki guest-starring on Sesame Street as Bruce did on Fury’s quest to garner positive public opinion is even less likely to happen than puppets coming to life. So whatever Murray’s impact on the Other Guy or Elmo’s influence on Wolverine, Loki would probably take either of them and rip the puppet to shreds. 

 

 

Loki just never goes away. He’s persistent; Bruce would give him points for that, but it’s irritating when Loki ambushes them in the middle of a small-scale Kree attack, and the Other Guy drops the three soldiers he’s pulverizing and heads right in Loki’s direction.

Loki gives the other guy a wide berth, throwing his image to the far edges of the battle whenever he gets too close, but Hulk is persistent too, very single minded in almost everything, including this.

They continue to leap-frog like a giant game of tag through the city while the rest of the team continues fending off the Kree. Where Loki goes, Hulk wants to follow, even with Bruce trying to convince him otherwise. Over the top of the Rock and through Central Park, and then down again to lower Manhattan. 

They’ve covered most of the city by the time Bruce stops trying to convince the Other Guy to return to the battle. Whatever Loki came here to do, at least he’s too distracted running from Hulk to actually do it. 

And that’s when Loki leaps. Straight for Tony as he flies by. Loki lands on his back, holding on when Tony spins in tight circles or swerves in tight arcs. Narrowly missing one of Tony’s missiles, Loki reaches around, finds a weak point – or makes one – and pulls circuits out of the suit. 

For once, Bruce and the Other Guy react the same, one’s scream of rage echoed by the other, muscles constrained by the tension of wrath, boiling up and out of their skin. 

If the damage reached his arc reactor, if Loki continues to rip apart his suit and damages it in the process, Tony has minutes before his heart stops entirely.

Tony falls, clutching at Loki who can’t get away, the momentum too much, and like their first battle, the Other Guy leaps for Tony. Mid-air, he gathers them both in their arms, holding them up and apart as they fall. Holding them safe as he hits the ground, breaking the pavement where he lands. 

Wind knocked out of them, possible a few bruised – if not broken – bones, both of them are silent while the other guy settles in and starts on that odd rumble in his chest. The Iron Man suit is all hard angles and not really built for cuddling, but somehow the other guy manages. 

“Oh good,” Tony says finally, a little faint. "I was starting to feel a little left out. Okay, not so tight, buddy, I do need to breathe-“

Loki twists his head, mouth turned back in a snarl. “Does your incessant chatter ever cease?”

“He doesn't, though,” Tony says, elbow nudging playfully against the Other Guy’s chest. Before Bruce can decide if he should be amused, despairing or having a _freaking heart attack_ in his corner of their head-space, the Other Guy bands his arm tighter around Loki as Tony continues, “Demigod and all. You can hug him a little harder.”

Hulk does.

 

 

“He's been compromised,” Natasha says as Bruce is tightening the drawstring on his sweats. 

He looks at her and has no answers. He doesn’t know what happened with Murray. He doesn’t know what changed or how a kid’s TV show worked magic when nothing Bruce tried ever worked, not yoga, not herbal teas, not even a bullet to the head. 

But the Other Guy’s never been one for words or explanation. He rumbles in Bruce’s head, focus elsewhere. 

On Loki, locked away in a cell far too similar to the one built for Bruce, should the Other Guy- Should things go wrong.

“He always was,” Bruce says. 

 

 

Loki escapes, of course he escapes, and Bruce can only hope that he decides to stay away from now on. Even he must see the pattern emerging. 

But for someone as smart as Thor claims him to be, he’s persistent in the weirdest ways. He doesn’t go much further than the base. In truth, he doesn’t even leave the base because he doesn’t get that far before the Other Guy destroys the twelfth shirt in a month and breaks through a wall to land in Loki’s path. 

“No,” Loki says, hands out. He drops his weapon and starts to back away. “No. No no-”

Reason never works with the Other Guy, and Bruce is tired of trying. Instead, he thinks, go get 'em buddy. And he does, wrapping his one arm tight around Loki and leaning back far enough that Loki’s feet no longer touch the ground. 

“Valhalla, _why?_ ” Loki says, slumping into it. He squeaks when Hulk tightens his grip, but otherwise says no more. 

Hawkeye appears from absolutely nowhere, Natasha at his side. He’s snickering; the Other Guy rumbles deep in his chest. 

Its laughter, Bruce realizes suddenly, this sound that’s like rage but isn’t rage. Laughter or amusement of some sort, like a great big cat purring and he’s too shocked by that to do much of anything when the Other Guy turns to Hawkeye and scoops him up with his free arm and then hoists him over his shoulder like a child might a doll.

“Oh my god,” Clint says, and Bruce echoes the sentiment. 

“Empathy,” the Other Guy says, and then carts them both back to base, Natasha’s laughter trailing after them. 

 

 

They put him back in the cell. It won’t hold him, but it’s the best they can do for right now. At least until they figure out where the cage failed. But instead of cursing or tossing vicious slurs like expected, Loki retreats, sitting in the middle of the floor cross-legged, and watches. Waits. 

It makes Bruce strangely nervous, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but Loki just sits there for days, mostly unmoving except for the occasional glances toward the cameras in the room, like he knows when Bruce is watching. 

 

 

In the middle of the night Bruce wakes up, suddenly, and unexpectedly, heart ticking a little faster than he’d like. 

It's Loki.

The Other Guy rumbles in the back of Bruce's mind, where he's usually not-so-safely tucked away. 

Bruce gets out of bed and Loki takes a step back. He holds no weapon, but that doesn’t mean he’s defenseless or any less dangerous.

He’s silent, mouth a tight line, not reaching for spells or going on the offensive. Loki isn’t a threat to him; Bruce has yet to find something that actually is. He knows that and he knows that Loki knows that. Still, Bruce keeps as tight a lid as he can on the Other Guy. For all he knows, they’d just end up cuddling on the bed, but they might just destroy the room or the entire floor of Stark Tower instead. 

Finally, Loki breaks. "What magic have you?” And then, a little more desperate than Bruce expects, “What close-contact magics are you weaving about my person? I do not… _what have you done to me?_ ”

“You think it’s a spell.” Bruce considers that. It might be one, actually, but even magic has a hard time controlling the Other Guy. “Listen, that’s more your area than it is mine.” Then he pauses, replays that. “You think I’m doing something to you?”

“Of course!” Loki paces, back and forth at the foot of Bruce’s bed. “Your monster’s embrace is a cage. I cannot- this will not stand!” 

Bruce stares at him, letting him rant for a few more minutes before he says, “Hugging is your kryptonite. That. I did not see that coming.” 

“Enough! You will end this!” 

The Other Guy rumbles, more like he’s turning over in his sleep instead of fighting to emerge. 

Loki sees it. He must. He takes a step back, hands up like he’s trying to placate or soothe. When he speaks again, his voice is quiet. “It must be a spell. Nothing else would explain-”

“You know enough about me to know I don’t control him. At all.”

“Yes. The monster inside you.”

“I,” Bruce says. “Really wouldn’t insult him right now.” 

“Tell me!” 

If JARVIS has alerted the others yet, if JARVIS is paying attention. 

“There is a place,” Bruce says. “I can tell you how to get there.” Loki's head tilts, like he's actually interested, so Bruce keeps going. “It’s a faraway place. A place of sunny days, sweeping the clouds away. Where the air is sweet. And everything’s A-OK…”

He doesn’t remember any more of the lyrics. 

Loki doesn’t seem to notice. “Ah,” he says, looking thoughtful. “Sentiment.”

“The letter S,” Bruce says.

Loki nods once. “You will take me there,” he says. “You will take me there and this enchantment on you and on me will cease.” 

“I don’t think so.” 

Loki stares like he can’t believe Bruce would say no. 

“It stops you cold. Why would I want to stop that? You’re not destroying cities anymore, or having much luck hurting any of us.” Bruce shrugs. “The Other Guy’s not doing much damage either.” 

Loki jerks his hand down, a sharp jerk. “I will! If you do not take me there, I will ravish this realm until there is nothing but ruins. Ashes will fill your mouth until you choke on them and your companions burn around you. I will tear away everything until you are helpless to do anything but destroy-”

Bruce keeps his baseline emotion as anger. It’s not hard, with all he’s been through, but he feels it shoot up, and his last moment of control is to lift his head to watch as Loki’s back hits the wall. 

Loki tries to run, tries to rip a hole in the wall and flee through the Tower, but the Other Guy reaches out and grabs his leg and yanks him back. Loki fights, with fists and elbows, flashes of magic, twisting even when Hulk gets his arms around him. 

But it’s true. It is his kryptonite to be held like a child, like a friend, like a loved one, but they don’t end up cuddling on the bed. The Other Guy isn’t one for stairways or elevators, much less doors, so Bruce is probably going to have repay Tony for the repairs of his bedroom’s outer walls. Somehow. 

The Other Guy’s well known enough now that the late-late night pedestrians don’t really run away screaming anymore, even if most of them jerk and stare, pressing themselves against the buildings as they pass, the Other Guy toting Loki like a sack of potatoes. One of the bicyclists even raises a hand in greeting as they cross the bridge into Queens. 

They go several miles, but the Other Guy doesn’t tire, not really, even when he’s toting around an Asgardian demigod. The building is mostly nondescript, much like all the others around it, but the Other Guy seems to know where he’s going. He kicks in a door, and Bruce wonders if he’s ever going to clear up his monumental debt from vandalism. 

The Other Guy sets Loki down, and Loki magics a small glowing orb in his hands, sending it aloft to light the room. 

In their shared headspace, Bruce frowns. They’re on the set of Sesame Street. The actual street with the brightly colored store fronts, the brick buildings too small to be real but large enough to fake it, empty because they’re not filming and the set should be closed.

Loki steps further unto the set, pausing near the subway doors. “This is the place? I do not understand. Has this been a trick?” 

The Other Guy grunts, lumbering closer. Loki backs away, but they both pause when something moves in the corner. Something small, mostly hidden in the shadows, and when it comes into the light, Bruce can only stare, unable to find words. Is that-

It is. 

It’s Elmo. 

It’s Elmo and he’s moving and _there’s no one controlling him_.

Loki steps forward, ignoring the Other Guy’s sudden silence, unaware of Bruce’s shock. “I demand an end to this spellwork. I will not be held by such-“ 

And suddenly Elmo isn’t the only one moving. 

The lid of the garbage can nearest to Bruce comes off. 

Oscar, Bruce thinks, and Cookie Monster and Grover, and others, most of whom Bruce doesn’t recognize, in bright fluffy colors. He doesn’t remember much about the show. It’s been a long time since he’s been a kid, and even being on the show didn’t prepare him for this. 

And Loki senses it, from the Other Guy or from Bruce or from some instinct and he starts to back away, but one brightly colored puppet latches on to his leg, and another climbs unto his back, holding tight to his arm. Loki tries to shake them off, at first, but they’re undeterred, coming closer until there’s a sea of puppets surrounding him, holding onto his limbs and his torso, _hugging him_.

“Oh my god,” Bruce says, because he’s Bruce now, because the Other Guy has slipped away unnoticed, somehow. 

After a moment, Loki quiets, looking shell-shocked and wholly uncertain. Kryptonite-hugging. By living puppets.

Somehow, he’d thought turning into a giant green rage monster would be the weirdest part of his life. 

Elmo takes Loki’s hand and he gets to his feet. He’s lacking his helmet but still towering, but that doesn’t stop Elmo from holding his arms out. It doesn’t stop Loki from picking up Elmo and letting the little red guy wrap his arms around his neck. It doesn’t stop him from following when Elmo points down the street, which suddenly seems impossibly larger than it was only moments ago. 

Empathy. Bruce doesn’t know whether to cringe or to laugh or to let the other guy take the reins so he can wake up in the cornfields of Kansas tomorrow morning. 

“Hi Bruce!”

Bruce looks down.

Murray, Loveable, cuddly Murray. Red fur and yellow hair, big eyes more alert, more aware than the last time they’d met. But then, the last time he’d seen him, Murray had been a puppet. He thinks. Bruce isn’t so sure about that anymore. 

“Hi Murray,” Bruce says. He pauses. Swallows. “You’re…” 

“We’ll take care of him,” Murray says because he must realize that Bruce’s brain is halted, stuck, still trying to process that this is real, it’s not a dream, that he’s probably not ever going to find an explanation for any of this. 

“That’s… good.”

Loki doesn’t even look back when he’s led further into Sesame Street, Elmo on one hand and Grover on the other. He remembers vaguely seeing something about Grover pretending to be an Avenger after the whole press thing, but he’d chalked it up to appealing to kids with the whole superhero thing. 

“It’s time for you go now,” Murray says, “But we’ll see you soon!” 

 

 

“I don’t fucking believe it,” Fury says, and Bruce spreads his hands helplessly. 

 

 

He’s ambushed when he leaves his lab for breakfast, thick arms wrapping tight around him and lifting him a few feet into the air. Used to be, that sort of thing would yank the Other Guy out of Bruce’s head and into full-on destructive mode, but the big guy just rumbles pleasantly – pleasantly! – when Bruce hugs Thor back. 

Such is their new morning routine, anyway, so Bruce lets Thor half-carry, half-drag him into the shared area, right to the couch where Jane is already curled up, making notations in her notebook. She looks up when Thor sits next to her, greets them absently, and then returns to the math Bruce only gets a glimpse of before Thor pulls him down next to him. 

Ah, Bruce thinks, when Thor turns up the volume on the TV. He’d forgotten the time.

Loki looks healthier than he did the last time Bruce saw him outside of a television set, skin not quite so pale and the bruises under his eyes gone. He doubts it’s stage makeup. 

He’s with a girl puppet today. Zoe, Bruce thinks. He knows their names now, and what they normally do on the show, and it’s strange because Zoe likes to dance and her bright tutu clashes with Loki’s Asgardian armor. Not real? Real? It’s hard to tell anymore. 

The Other Guy certainly doesn’t care, half in control, half not, forefront in their combined head-space but not fully emerging, deeply pleased as he is every time they sit down to watch the show. 

Zoe twirls for the camera; Bruce thinks, he thinks he sees a flash of a smile from Loki but when he turns out to the audience, it’s gone. 

“I am Loki of Asgard, and I am burdened with a glorious purpose.” He pauses, immeasurably serious and taking a moment to steady himself. “Today, we will learn about sentiment.”

 

 

Thor goes with when the Other Guy visits Sesame Street again, but it’s Loki that reaches for Thor first, Loki that tentatively pats Thor’s shoulder, that lets his grip strengthen until it quickly devolves into an actual real hug before they sequester to a table for two in the Arbor, right outside Elmo’s. 

Whatever they talk about, neither Bruce nor the Other Guy know; that’s between brothers. Besides, Murray tugs on his hand and wants to know if they can talk more about empathy. 

But when they leave, Thor pauses to scoop multiple puppets into his arms before they’re off set, their stick arms reaching for a handhold and hugging back, bright tufts of various colors clashing against the red of his cape. Thor only laughs when the Other Guy wraps his arms around both him and the puppets in Thor’s arms, holding them all close.


End file.
